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THE TIME OF HIPPOKRATES. 53
order to increase their selling value * The librarians who
were charged with the inspection and examination of the
acquired books did not always possess the knowledge and
means necessary to distinguish the true from the false or to
make certain of the authenticity of documents. Thus it
came about that certain works were declared to be by
authors who really had had no hand in them. The Hippokratic
writings among others met with this fate : even at
that time people had been at work upon them with the
result that essential differences had been introduced into
the text.t Can we wonder then if to the collection which
originally contained only the works of HIPPOKRATES and
of his nearest relatives, other writings have been added
which did not emanate from them at all.J The transcribers,
who used the manuscripts at hand in the libraries to copy
from, contributed to this, by giving confirmation and more
general acceptance to certain writings as of real Hippokratic
origin, and bold editors increased the error by
arbitrary additions to, and enlargements and alterations
of, the text.§ When GALEN wrote his commentary to the
works of HIPPOKRATES he had before him a copy of the
text with many different readings : he followed the plan, as
he says himself, || of always considering the most ancient
reading as the correct one. Under these circumstances it
is conceivable that even in very ancient times differences
of opinion prevailed as to which writings were really composed
by HIPPOKRATES and which were not. This question
has exercised the ingenuity of the learned and of critics up
to the most recent times, and even in the last few years
LlTTRE, ERMERINS, KUHLEWEIN and others have made
attempts to bring it nearer solution. In its present form
* GALEN op. cit. T. xvi, 5.
f GALEN op. cit. T. xvii, A. 606.
X Cf. the letter of ST. AUGUSTINE to FAUSTUS, the ManicfiEean, L. 7,3, 6 (T.
vi, p. 493. Edit. FROBEN 1556).
§ GALEN op. cit. T. xv, 21. xvii, A. 795.
|| GALEN op. cit. xvii, A. 1005.